WTF, Maxim is still in business! Who knew? The other vital question: Why?

Well, whatever the reason for its continued survival, the publication has an article by Brandon Friederich offering five tech prognostications from engineer/inventor Dr. Ian Pearson, who claims 85% accuracy when predicting 10-15 years down the road. He for sure foresaw our text-friendly society back 25 years ago, though I haven’t gone over all of his calls to verify his conversion rate. Fellow futurist Ray Kurzweil, for instance, has touted his precision in seeing the next big thing, though a close inspection of his record reveals some jaw-dropping gaffes. I don’t know if Pearson has similarly gaping potholes in his path to tomorrow, though he’s clearly a colorful thinker.

The following is the first item from the list of visions (which also predicts “talking pets”):

1. INTERCONNECTED BRAINS 

This is exactly what it sounds like. According to Pearson, we’re nearing a point where people will have the ability to communicate telepathically from any where on earth through a sort of global server that interfaces with the brain. That means that instead of using Google or Siri to find answers to life’s trivial questions, you’ll just have to think about it, and the answer will be made available over a network. And the best part is that all of this will be done without any invasive surgery or dramatic changes to the brain.

“It definitely will not be opening up your head and sticking a chip in it,” said Pearson.  “With just an injection… tiny little nanotechnology-based particles will float through your bloodstream across the blood-brain barrier and connect to the neurons themselves. They will be able to pick up electrical signals directly from those neurons and feed them outside into the IT, and your brain basically becomes part of the IT system.”•